warhol_basel
Andy Warhol, Untitled, 1984, Acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas, 40 x 40 inches, signed and dated verso.

An excellent example of the portraits commissioned by society elites, "Untitled" (Beach Ball, 1984) is a rare, sentimental portrait by Warhol of a young child on a beach. Rather than portraying celebrities through the lens of mass media and consumption, Warhol approaches this portrait of an unidentified child with the same mass-produced silkscreen technique. While most Society works refer to the glamour and aspirations of the sitters, "Untitled" (Beach Ball) is distinctly un-glamorous, speaking more to the innocence of the child portrayed.

This painting is recorded in the archives of the Andy Warhol Foundation, and will be included in the upcoming Catalog Raisonné of paintings.

Andy Warhol (1928-1994) defined a decade and a culture with his groundbreaking Pop Art. He is considered by many to be the most influential American artist of the second half of the 20th century. Initially a popular Manhattan commercial artist, Warhol achieved fame with his multiple images of soup cans, soda bottles, dollar bills and celebrities, which revealed the beauty within mass culture.

Selected Public Collections:
Museum of Modern Art (New York, NY)
Museum of Fine Arts (Boston, MA)
National Galleries of Scotland (Edinburgh, UK)
Guggenheim Bilbao (Bilbao, ES)